Unreasonable Hospitality
“How do you make the people who work for you and the people you serve feel seen and valued? How do you give them a sense of belonging? How do you make them feel part of something bigger than themselves?”
-Will Guidara
In the early days of experience management, practitioners focused on applying human-centered insights to improve product design, marketing, sales, and service. Today, the focus on being human-centered has broadened, as brands tap into the emotional connection employees have with their company’s mission, vision, purpose and values. Brands that do this best grow faster and are more profitable. Their cultures are a source of competitive advantage, a renewable energy source that powers their growth.
Will Guidara's book Unreasonable Hospitality is a must read for anyone looking to energize their growth by focusing on the CX and culture connection. Will learned from his mentor Danny Meyer, who laid out his Enlightened Hospitality philosophy in his own book, Setting the Table. Danny infused Enlightened Hospitality at top restaurants across the Union Square Hospitality Group (Union Square Café, Gramercy Tavern, Tabla, The Modern) as well as Shake Shack. Danny saw Will’s potential early on, empowering him to grow as a leader at the café at The Modern and later at Eleven Madison Park (EMP). Together with Daniel Humm, executive chef for EMP, who agreed upfront to run the restaurant as a true collaborative partnership (Daniel lobbied Danny Meyer for Will to become the new general manager after seeing his energy at Union Square Hospitality Group’s monthly meetings of GMs and chefs), the two co-leaders applied the lessons they learned from their mentor to take EMP from a two-star restaurant to four stars and even reached the #1 ranking for the World’s 50 Best Restaurants. Will’s book tells the story of how they cultivated a people-first culture that transformed EMP into the “four-star restaurant for the next generation.”
Beyond the Product Experiences
Unreasonable Hospitality is about building an emotional connection with guests, providing a world class experience that goes beyond amazing food. In the book, Will talks about the “bubble” that exceptional restaurants create around each table, where every detail comes together from the food, the service, the lighting, and the music so that “time ceases to exist.” He shares many entertaining stories for how the team at EMP removed friction from the experience and created a stronger emotional connection with guests. For example, EMP hosts greet guests as they come in the door by name without guests having to first check in at a podium. EMP extended these magical moments throughout the meal, turning the coffee service and dessert cart into beyond the product experiences. The restaurant also empowered staff to identify opportunities for Dreamweavers to surprise and delight guests. These stories became “legends” that staff are proud to share with one another. All of these are examples of providing beyond the product experience that deepen an emotional connection with the brand.
How does EMP do it? What’s the secret behind the magic tricks they come up with to surprise and delight guests? EMP empowers its employees to ask, “what’s the hospitality solution?” For 95% of the moments, manage costs so that you can spend lavishly on the other 5%. For example, giving guests a chance to taste a Grand Cru Burgundy as part of a wine flight. But it’s not just these unexpected extravagances that have the most impact on creating truly memorable and magical moments. Often, it’s their pricelessness, for example serving a NY hot dog with a gourmet preparation to a table overhead saying the one thing they didn’t get to experience in NY was a hotdog from a street vendor.
Will not only led by symbolic acts, but also by listening to employees and empowering them to come up with a continuous stream of ways to exceed customer expectations. Will tapped into employees’ energy and excitement by providing opportunities for team members to step up and contribute to experience innovation. Let’s dive in more for how EMP built a Culture of Collaboration, engaging its frontline employees on its journey to #1.
Creating a Culture of Collaboration
Will sees a leader’s key responsibility as identifying the strengths of team members and helping them realize their full potential. Everyone is creative, not just those in the kitchen. Will and Daniel encouraged team members to step up through EMP’s Ownership Program. They started the program by turning over responsibility for EMP’s beer selection and every aspect of its beer service to Kirk, one of its servers just a few years out of college. This freed up the sommelier to focus more on wine, while tapping into Kirk’s energy for everything beer related. Kirk read every trade publication and explored the rarest beers from around the world. He trained others on how to pour beer and helped pick the best glassware. One year into the program, EMP’s beer service was recognized as one of the best. This model was replicated by Sambath for tea and by Jim for coffee. EMP didn’t settle for meeting expectations for these experiences, contributing to its overall reputation for world class service. EMP extended the Ownership Program to every aspect of the restaurant, empowering and energizing its frontline team.
Will and Daniel also closely involved the team in shaping the culture at EMP. Every business has rituals, and one of the ways to foster shared mindsets and behaviors at restaurants is the pre-meal before service. It’s a half hour ritual where frontline employees come together as a high-performing team. Beyond the usual focus on covering new menu items and training staff, Will and Daniel used the pre-meal sessions to engage team members on the culture, itself. After a restaurant critic commented on how EMP should learn from Miles Davis, the team built a list of words that describe the jazz legend, including cool, inspired, innovative, vibrant, and collaborative. The team aligned on Education, Passion, Excellence, and Hospitality as focus areas to cultivate.
Scaling Cultural Behaviors
Culture is all about energy. People draw energy from one another, and it either flows or gets bottled up and dissipates. People’s mindsets and behaviors lift each other up and can have a large cumulative impact on an organization’s performance.
EMP recognized that to truly build a shared culture where everyone contributes, it needed to give everyone a chance to see both the kitchen and the dining room. So, Will and Daniel decided to start everyone as a kitchen server, running food from the kitchen to the dining room. Beyond the Ownership Program, they also decided to give team members an opportunity to lead the pre-meal ritual on a rotating basis. Trusting the team boosted everyone’s pride and they stepped up.
Change didn’t come all at once directed from the top. Collectively the team shared their ideas and energy and made many improvements over time. The more Will and Daniel put trust in the team and demonstrated they believed in them, the more responsible they became. Desired cultural behaviors were reinforced and turned into regular habits. Storytelling among team members inspired others to raise their game. People demonstrated they were supportive of one another. One team member introduced the “Deep Breathing Club” based on their experience volunteering at a juvenile hospital. Anyone could walk up to an overwhelmed colleague and say “DBC” and what’s communicated is “I see you, and what you are going through. We’re in this together and we’re going to get through this together, so what can I do right now to help?”
EMP scaled these behaviors through a holistic system of change, including hiring for the right cultural fit, rituals, symbolic acts, storytelling, regular feedback, employee listening, and empowerment. Together, this holistic approach resulted in far more ideas and energy than any metrics-driven approach ever could. Yes, creative vision was important, but EMP got to #1 because of the close alignment of its strategy and culture.
I’m not going to ruin the story by sharing all the details along the journey to #1. I highly recommend reading the book. It’s great storytelling, and you’re sure to pick up even more insights than I could hope to capture here.
If you enjoyed this review, check out others on the JourneySpark website by clicking here. In particular, you might find my reviews for Atomic Habits, Culture by Design, Creating the Organization of the Future, and The Knowing-Doing Gap most interesting.
I also recommend checking out podcast episodes focused on how EX and CX go together here on the CX & Culture Connection website.
If you’d like to dive deeper on these topics, I invite you to join one of our CX & Culture Connection ™ mastermind groups. I’m teaming with Tamar Cohen, CCXP on mastermind groups focused on Amplifying Your EX and CX Together. You can learn more by going to the mastermind page on our website, where you can also apply to join.
Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me on LinkedIn via DM if you’d like to discuss the book or learn more about the mastermind groups!